Refugee Review Tribunal AUSTRALIA RRT RESEARCH RESPONSE Research Response Number: IND17666 Country: India Date: 1 December 2005 Keywords: India – Tamil Nadu – Peoples Art and Literature Society – CPI(ML) – Police This response was prepared by the Country Research Section of the Refugee Review Tribunal (RRT) after researching publicly accessible information currently available to the RRT within time constraints. This response is not, and does not purport to be, conclusive as to the merit of any particular claim to refugee status or asylum. Questions 1. Please provide information regarding the Peoples Art and Literature Society (Makkal kalai illakkiya kazhagam). 2. Does the Society support the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist)? 3. Do the police take action against persons selling Communist Party literature? 4. Do the police take action against persons selling anti-government literature? 5. Is the CPIML journal (or magazine called ‘New Culture’) and literature illegal, and/or anti- government? 6. Are you able to say what the ‘ruling class party’ is? 7. Is PALS an offshoot of the Tamil Nadu Organising Committee (TNOC)? 8. Is TNOC an offshoot of CPIML? 9. Can the police take persons into preventative detention in Chennai, e.g. when top political leaders are visiting Chennai? 10. What are the Tamil speaking states in India? 11. Are there reports of police allowing prisoners to beat other prisoners? RESPONSE 1. Please provide information regarding the Peoples Art and Literature Society (Makkal kalai illakkiya kazhagam). 2. Does the Society support the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist)? Only limited references to Makkal Kalai Ilakkiya Kazhagam (the People’s Art and Literary Association (PALA)) were located in the available sources. Several articles refer to this group in association with other left-wing organisations in particular the New Democratic Labour Front who advocate “Marxism-Leninism-Mao thought”. Other articles report on the PALA’s protest activities. However, it is difficult to determine their ideology from these as they primarily focus on the group’s actions rather than their politics. In 2004 the PALA issued a joint statement with the New Democratic Labour Front, criticising the World Social Forum (WSF), an anti-globalisation forum which was to be held in Mumbai. This statement provides an indication of their political ideology: The World Social Forum is holding its Fourth Annual Meeting at Mumbai from 16th to 21st January 2004. The CPI, CPI (M) and the NGOs are actively mobilizing for the event. With the slogan ‘Another World is possible’, the WSF claims to provide a forum for all the forces opposed to Globalization. Even a glance at the WSF Charter would reveal the fact that it is not a front against Imperialism, but a forum that institutionalizes the anti-imperialist forces through devious methods. By dissipating people’s movements and dampening revolutionary forces, the WSF is attempting to manufacture consent for the implementation of Globalization from below… …an alternative that does not demand the destruction of Imperialism, or stops short of overturning down the capitalist social system, betrays itself to be hollow. The cry for a solution to this crisis is destined to be a cry for Socialism and Communism. True, the International Communist movement is splintered and weak. But this fact does not alter the truth that Socialism and dictatorship of the proletariat is the answer to Imperialist aggression and Fascism. This is no dream of a distant Utopia or empty sloganeering of an orthodox Marxist. This is an obligation imposed upon us by the most orthodox and reactionary Bourgeois of the world. All ‘spaces’ that hitherto existed between the Bourgeois and the Proletariat, between Imperialism and oppressed Nations are gone. All the shock absorbers are removed and Socialism is pulled into the arena to confront imperialism face to face… The major constituents of the WSF, i.e., – the NGOs, Anarchists, Trotskyites and Post- Modernists of various hues etc., – are the strategic weapons in the armoury of Imperialism to be used against Communism. These forces are ideologically united in their crusade. In spite of the weakness of the revolutionary movement the enemy apprehends Communism gaining influence as the alternative. Hence, the time-tested tactics of promoting social democrats, Anarchists, Trotskyites and pseudo-communists is on the play now. The vanguard role of PT in the WSF and the active role of CPI, CPI (M), CPI (M-L) (Liberation) in India are part of this conspiracy; a conspiracy to gain credibility by portraying a bourgeois formation as a red coalition. Or ‘left pluralism’ in the now infamous NGO-discourse... In a world where the aggressive face of Imperialism is getting increasingly exposed, in a situation where the illusions of bourgeois democracy are shattered, in the times when the enemy scrambles over everything to find a credible political alternative, it is the duty of the Communist Revolutionaries to hold high the banner of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tse-Tung Thought and expose the lackeys of Imperialism who pretend to be Communists and Socialists. Underplaying the ideological and political issues in order to sound ‘democratic’ is nothing but opportunism. We should not mince words. The proletarian movement need not factor its criticisms in order to appear polite towards bourgeois intellectuals (‘Smash Imperialism’ 2004, Nadir website, 17 January – http://www.nadir.org/nadir/initiativ/agp/free/wsf/mumbai2004/0117smash_imperialism.htm – Accessed 28 November 2005 – Attachment 1). In March 2005 PALA also posted a paper on anti-globalisation on the New Democracy Information Centre – Tamilnadu website. The introduction to the website indicates that the PALA promotes “Marxism-Leninism-Mao thought”: We are communist revolutionaries from Tamilnadu, India. We support the Marxist-Leninist revolutionary mass organisations namely People’s Art And Literature Association (PALA), Peasants Liberation Front (PLF), Revolutionary Students And Youth Front (RSYF), and New Democratic Labour Front (NDLF). Long live proletarian revolution! Long live Marxism- Leninism-Mao thought (‘Globalisation, saffronisation and cultural oppression’ 2005, New Democracy Information Centre – Tamilnadu website, 14 March – http://ndictn.blogspot.com/ – Accessed 28 November 2005 – Attachment 2), A number of articles detail the group’s participation in various demonstrations. An article posted on India Resource Centre website, on 8 October 2005, reports on a PALA protest against a Coca-Cola bottling plant, alleging that it “will lead to the depletion and contamination of groundwater and affect agriculture in the drought-prone district”. This article also describes the group as Marxist: The agitation against the bottling unit of a multinational soft drink giant in water- starved Tirunelveli district in Tamil Nadu is fast turning into a battle against the privatisation of water resources. Resistance to the Rs.30-crore beverage bottling plant coming up in the southern Tamil Nadu district of Tirunelveli is intensifying. The protesters allege that the unit, a water-intensive one will lead to the depletion and contamination of groundwater and affect agriculture in the drought-prone district. The plant is being set up to manufacture branded items of the multinational soft drink giant, Coca-Cola… In the latest of a series of protests, held on September 23, nearly 1,000 activists of the Democratic Youth Federation of India (DYFI) and the Students Federation of India (SFI) were arrested when they staged a demonstration and road roko at Duraiyur, on the Tirunelveli-Madurai National Highway, close to the SIPCOT centre. DYFI State secretary S. Kannan, cautioned that the State government’s action in placing a huge quantum of water from the Thamiraparani river at the disposal of the bottling unit might mark the beginning of a major thrust in the direction of privatising drinking water resources consistent with its loyalty to World Bank-driven neoliberal policies. Kannan said the agitation would continue “until the licence to the unit is withdrawn by the government”. Ten days earlier, over 2,000 volunteers, including a substantial number of women, of the People’s Art and Literary Association (PALA), the Peasants Liberation Front, the Revolutionary Students and Youth Front and the New Democratic Labour Front, all Marxist groups from different parts of the State, participated in a rally in Tirunelveli against the granting of the licence. A Bangalore-based group of 50 “revolutionary students and youth” were also among the protesters. When the agitators later marched towards the construction site to stage a demonstration, they were arrested (Viswanathan, S 2005, ‘Bottling Thamiraparani’, India Resource Centre website, 8 October – http://www.indiaresource.org/news/2005/2022.html – Accessed 28 November 2005 – Attachment 3). An earlier article from India Reach website, on the same issue reports on the difficulties that the PALA had in obtaining an application to stage the protest against the bottling plant. The application was initially refused, but the court subsequently directed the group “submit a fresh application seeking permission”. This article also refers to the PALA as being “an ultra- left outfit”: The Madurai Bench of Madras High Court has quashed the police order denying permission to an ultra-left outfit to hold street-corner protest meetings in Tirunelveli district opposing the setting up of a bottling plant by soft drink MNC Coke. Mr Justice